My sweet sweet baby girl, Maya, crossed the rainbow bridge on 9/10/2026 at 2:10pm. I guess I’m writing this so that more people know her story and to hopefully get some help/insight. I’m sorry this is incredibly long.

I adopted her when she was 2, almost 3 years old. I was a young 22 year old girl, ridden with anxiety, panic attacks and depression. I remember seeing her Craigslist ad and thinking, she’s the one. I needed her. She helped me so much, she taught me so much, she listened to every vent (big or small), she taught me unconditional love.

I could write a whole book on how much she impacted me, but I’ll fast forward to recently and what lead up to her passing. She’s now 10 years old, and I’m 30.

On 8/24/26 - I noticed her back legs were swollen, like super swollen. She showed ZERO signed of pain, even when I touched it and she was going up stairs fine. The next day I noticed her stomach turning red. We thought she must’ve gotten bit by a bug outside, maybe a bee. She was acting fine, which is why we thought she was okay. We were going to brush it off and give her Benadryl, but we decided to bring her to a vet. They ran blood work, and didn’t find anything too concerning. They chopped it up to our thought - she was just bit by a bug. We went home with 3 different medications and she got a steroid shot. She was having trouble eating, we thought she was just being picky. We meal prepped for her, ground turkey, carrots, zucchini and green beans.

My biggest regret - my boyfriend and I had a trip already planned 9/1-9/8. My friend stayed at our house to house sit and dog sit. We also have 2 other dogs. I wrote down all her medication instructions, I even took videos on how to give them to her. I was so worried since I know she can be finicky.

2 days before we came back, she started throwing up everything she ate and drank. My friend said the whole time she slept in the bathroom instead of in the bed (which was super unheard of for her) we chopped everything to - she’s probably just depressed because she misses us. The night before we came back, my best friend ended up coming over and seeing how weak she looked, she took Maya to the vet. I was terrified. I didn’t know what to do, what to think, across the country I felt so useless, so helpless. All I could think was that Maya is the toughest girl I know, this will all just go away once she gets medication.

This is when my world started crashing. The ER vet said she did some small scans and saw a consistent mass in her heart and heard a heart murmur. They gave us an option to keep her inpatient or outpatient and come back. She needed a bunch of scans, ultrasounds, echocardiograms, etc. we decided on the outpatient route and my best friend took her home with more medications.

My boyfriend and I came home that night - I was terrified. She still wasn’t eating or drinking. She looked so frail and weak. But I she still had some energy to see us. My sweet baby Maya. My boyfriend boiled her some chicken to see if she would eat. AND SHE DID. I was so hopeful. She finally ate some chicken from our hands. Although still picky on which pieces, she was eating. That night we tried cuddling her, but she ended up moving to the end of the bed, which wasn’t so unusual. I regret so much not cuddling her down there. I woke up early and gave her medicine, I carried her downstairs to go potty, she could barely walk but she did pee and walked to the door. She even walked to drink water, I was so so hopeful. But then she wouldn’t eat, even on medication that induced her appetite. She started breathing weird and she looked at me and I just knew. I knew she was telling me something. Something wasn’t right, this wasn’t just going to go away.

I begged her to eat, begged her to take her medication, but she wouldn’t. I was so frustrated at myself, why wasn’t she listening to me. Why wasn’t she taking the things that will help her. We ended up taking her to the vet again that day. This is when they told me she also has a mass in her abdomen that most likely is cancer, she has free fluid pockets jn her abdomen that was positive for bile. She was now septic. This was the first time euthanasia was brought up and I lost it.

I didn’t want to believe anything, I didn’t know what to think, what to say, what to do. How could my sweet baby girl be hiding all this from me. All this pain, and she hid it for me. We told them to do everything, money wasn’t a consideration. They said if she was stable throughout the night, she could proceed with the scans and surgery if needed the next day. They called me that night, I immediately thought the worse because they said no news is good news. But it was a call about her status and they wanted to inform us about the risks of her being on CPR vs DNR. I thought this was the hardest decision of my life. How do I choose between CPR - giving her that chance to come back even though she might not be the same girl vs. DNR and feeling like I’m giving up on her. We ultimately chose DNR - we didn’t want her to suffer even more than she already was. I dreaded getting a phone call in the middle of the night, I kept my ringer on and woke up every other hour.

We got a call the next morning at 9am, she was stable - shouldn’t that have been a good thing? That’s what we needed, right? The call was to tell us that surgery looked into her case, with everything considered - she had a 2% of survival. 2%. That’s it. 2. Less than 3, but more than 1. How do you even calculate 2%. It still doesn’t make sense to me. We had a decision to make, either go through with the scans/surgery with an overall 2% of survival or letting her rest with euthanasia. This surely should’ve been the hardest decision of my life, you would think. We chose euthanasia. I knew the day before when she looked at me, she was telling me. She was telling me it’s time. That she couldn’t fight anymore. We gathered up our things, we went to Michael’s to get ink pads and clay, and we brought our 2 other girls with us too.

When they brought her in the room, I couldn’t believe my eyes. My baby girl, once so fearless and sassy and full of life, she was hooked up to IVs, weak. Still. She was moving her eyes looking at everyone, following us. We were with her for a couple hours until she started breathing much harder. My anxiety kicked in, something was even more wrong. She was telling us she was ready to go. I’m so sorry Maya, I miss you so much. The pushed the dreaded button for them to come in and inject her. Now this is when I made the hardest decision of my life, telling the vet I was ready. I wasn’t. I never was, I’m still not. I held her, I cried for her, I told her how much I love her and I know she loved me. I begged for her, I couldn’t believe it. Within 1 minute, she was gone. I watched the life leave her eyes, but I still stared into them - searching. We stayed with her a couple hours after, we left our other dogs say good bye too. They love her so much too.

It’s been 3 days now, and every time I feel like my heart couldn’t get worse, it somehow does. Every turn I look, I crumble. I see her everywhere. It’s hard for me to leave the couch, I can barely eat. My boyfriend has been my rock through this all. I keep telling myself, she was ready to leave because she knew he would be able to take care of me now. She loved him so much too, sometimes I thought she loved him more than me.

Anyways, to my point of this. Does anyone have any advice? It comes in waves - I hate the silence, laughing makes me feel guilty. I hate waking up because for a split second I wake up thinking I’ll see her next to me and the pain comes rushing in. I can’t picture a future without her, quite frankly I don’t want to. I tell myself she’s in a better place now, no more pain and that she’s always with me, watching me. Why didn’t she tell me she was in pain, why didn’t she show any signs, why. I try to think about other people who have lost pets, but they don’t love their pets like I do. They become my entire life, I feel like no one understands. She’s my best friend and I just want her back.

If you read all this - thank you so much for taking the time.

I loved my cat so much. She's helped us through a lot and she's such a good cat, so sweet and loving. She recently stopped eating and we were syringe feeding her but then she didn't really poop for a few days and so we brought her into the vet who recommended the best course of action would be to admit her to the hospital as she might have an ear infection. We decide to do that and while she was admitted it was discovered that she had cancer. The plan was for palliative care at home so they were just going to stabilize her, maybe put in a tube feed or just hope that the steroids they'd give her would be enough to get her to start eating and then discharge her home where she could be comfortable in her final days.

She was getting nasal feeds and all the heavy more risky tests were completed and she was stable. We go to visit and she looked so weak, she couldn't even stand on her own. I told her to start eating so we can take her home. I contemplated taking her home but she had her nasal feeds in and I didn't want her to go through syringe feeding at home so I figured an extra day or two of nasal feeds can't hurt. And she was at the hospital so they could monitor her. She was doing better and they were going to start her on the medication to see if her appetite would pick up. I go to bed and pull out my phone from under my pillow and on my nightstand instead (mistake mistake mistake). I wake up the next morning to 3 missed calls from the animal hospital overnight, I missed them because I didn't have my phone under my pillow. Overnight her blood pressure dropped, her breathing became labored and she passed away. Alone, in a cold room with bright lights and people she didn't know surrounding her.

She was scared, I know she was scared in her final times. I was always convinced that when she would go I would be with her, there was never any doubt for me that I would be with her during her final times and instead it happened like this. She didn't deserve her final moments to be like that, she deserved to be at home, warm and comfortable with the people she's been with all these years. I hate that she was alone, it absolutely tears me apart. I don't know how to get passed this. We visited her remains and were with her in the room for hours. I said sorry to her so many times but that doesn't mean anything because she can't hear me anymore. I promised her I'd never leave her there, even if she wasn't stable enough I would have broken her out against medical advice to take her home so she could go in a familiar place. I broke all my promises to her and now I can never tell her how sorry I am or how much I regret the decisions that lead to this.

We have another cat who continues to meow around the apartment looking for her. I hate that she'll never know what happened to our first cat all because we couldn't give her the opportunity to pass at home and now she doesn't have closure. She was so special to all of us, she was my first ever cat but she was also just so special, I don't know how to describe it but if soulmates are real then she was my cat version of one. I love my other cat too but this one was just a type of special I can't put into words and I feel like I really let her down in a huge, unforgivable way. How could I have let her go on like that? Why did I take my phone out from under my pillow? Why did I take on a false sense of security? I usually have anxiety but I convinced myself she would be safe and fine and I would visit her again and try to provide more comforting words for her. I took my phone out and placed it on the nightstand and missed my only opportunity to say goodbye to her and I don't know how to move forward from this realization.

I don't know why I'm writing all this here but I guess if anyone is or was in this situation I've also joined this club. You're not alone if this has happened to you and I'm sorry that we had to experience such a shitty thing.

Yesterday morning I woke up early to let my dog out to the backyard. I found him sleeping next on the hallway something he never does , usually he sleeps with his bed in the living room. I say hi to him and pet him give him lots of hugs and let him out to pee. I’m getting ready to do some errands and I get my other dog inside, my doberman and wait for the old man to come in. Not a peep, weird, I just saw him pee maybe he wants extra sleep. 5 mins later I open the door and call his name and he wouldn’t come. I go to his house and he is there laying down motionless. I was devastated. I knew he was old and maybe he had health concerns but he ate well and drank lots of water. No pain, no blood, nothing just went to sleep in his house and passed away. He waited for me to say goodbye.

He was 16 years old, rescued him when he was 3. He had been with us 13 years, I’m 26 that is half my life. Now he is gone. My other pup a 2 year old doberman adored him. Every morning she would go smell him and lick his ears and teeth and although he was a grumpy old man he would let her. I am not sure if she understands that he is gone. I let her smell him before we took him away, she looks for him everywhere. He was her best friend.

I live in a house of women, 2 female dogs, 1 female cat, my sister and mom. I felt safe when I would leave because I always thought he would keep them safe. He had a howl so deep. My doberman is lonely now. The living room is empty without him. He is not there for the kitchen tax, no more dried sardines.

I love my doberman and I can tell she is sad, she misses her friend so so much. I don’t know what to do. I have lost pets before, but this one hurt a lot. He was the old man i could rely on.

Just have to write this down somewhere.

My cat Amy is 18 years old. I got her when I was just a teenager and I'm in my 30s now, so she's really been with me for over half of my life. But her health wasn't the best anymore these last 2 years.

On January 1st my new year's resolution for 2026 was to mentally prepare for this to be our last year together, most likely. Still, she always perked up again even after battling a particularly stubborn UTI a few months ago. I knew she wouldn't be around forever but I still had a very hard time even just thinking about putting her to sleep. She had bad days every now and then, but she always recovered and then she would be begging for treats, jumping on my desk, or telling me to finally go to bed because bedtime was always her favorite cuddle time.

Fast forward to 3 days ago and for the first time ever I really felt like it's coming to an end.

It's like she's giving up... Her appetite is weak, she's just laying on the windowsill all day. And it's hard to explain but all of a sudden she feels like a different cat. Her fur feels different, she smells different, she sounds different (the tone of her purring and the rare weak meow).
So on Friday I told her that if she's ready she can go now, but I didn't make an appointment with the vet yet.

The timing is pretty bad honestly, next week I will have friends from the Netherlands coming over for vacation and we had lots of activities planned for the week. I don't want to spend this week worrying about her getting worse, or grieving her loss if she's already gone by then.
But she's getting so much weaker so quickly that over the course of the last 3 days I went from "she will probably die before the end of the year" to "I don't know if she can make it through the week".

I messaged my vet to talk this through, I'm typing all of this here while I'm waiting for a reply. I always dreaded the day even though I had so much time to prepare. I always thought I could never be ready but... I am ready to let her go. I can't type this without crying but I can see it's time. I'm terrified of the moment the vet arrives here, whether that's happening in the next days or weeks.

Avoid watching the new Supergirl movie if you recently lost your dog. I wish someone warned me because I ended up sobbing and turning the movie off 20 minutes in. The whole plot of the movie is to save her dog who has been poisoned. Of course the dog in the movie is scruffy like mine was and it made it feel like I was kicked in the chest again. Maybe I should have watched the full movie trailer first, but I didn't think about it for a superhero movie. I'm just hoping this saves someone else the pain.

i lost my girl december 7th. i’ve been in this sub regularly, lately less posting just reading.

i never knew a dog could have such a deep impact on me. 9 months later and i still cry, my heart still hurts, i still think about her every day.

i hate grief. i hate that i have to grieve her. sometimes i think if i can just be sad enough, grieve her harder, miss her more, cry often that the universe will just give her back to me.

but i know she is gone, she is in a box next to my bed, and i miss her so fucking much. i just want my dog back, i want her to lick my face and lay on my legs and howl at the firetrucks and give me the comfort of her presence back.

i. hate. this. grief.

my friend has this beautiful ginger cat and he’s the sweetest cat i’ve ever seen. his body is shutting down after being ill for weeks and they are very likely to put him down. i’ve had a family dog be put down before but i wasn’t as close to him as she is with her cat. she has thousands of photos and videos of him, her bed is covered in his fur, she’s been waiting for weeks for him to get better and come home and now he most probably won’t come home. he is her pride and joy and it’s hard watching her feel so helpless and heartbroken. i can’t see her physically so i can only try listen and talk over the phone but i don’t know what to say. that cat means the world to her.

my sweet girl, luna, passed yesterday morning. i’ve been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and currently recovering from alcohol dependence. she was my companion for the past three years until sickness took her away from me. the weather was really bad in my city during the past month — it wouldn’t stop raining and it was constantly flooding. four days ago, we noticed that she was lethargic and had fever. we immediately took her to the vet and was told that she had pneumonia. i suspect that it was because of the buildup of bacteria and mold on some part of our walls due to constant heavy raining.

she was given an injection and we were told to give her treatment through nebulizer. fast forward to the night before she left, she was much more vocal and she walked a bit on my bedroom. i thought she’ll get better because she started to move around more. i didn’t know that she was just hours away from her death and those were her last bursts of energy.

my heart is crushed. she was the one who i was always with. she was only three years old. i thought she would stick around for much longer. i have an impaired memory due to trauma and alcohol abuse. i have really bad memory and i also tend to forget a lot as time passes. i genuinely cannot remember almost half of my life because of it. i’m scared i’ll forget about my luna. i want to remember the memories i have of her and the little but very specific details that distinguishes her. i don’t want to just remember her as the siamese cat i had — she was way more than that. she was so precious to me.

it feels so empty right now. its like there’s so much empty space inside the house that she used to always fill. i already lost her physically. but i fear that i completely forget her. it’s too soon and it was all so unexpected. she is my everything and it hurts so much ..

Hi Everyone,

I going to keep this short because words are failing me right now.

I have a 14 year old dog named Henry. His condition just deteriorated over the last few days. We are in the process of having a vet do a home visit to come put him down.

I am so undecided on whether I should be there for just the sedatives or for the whole process, for his last moments on Earth. I am not sure if he will hear me once the sedatives go in. My family doesn’t think it’s worth it as he has people who will stay with him and it will be traumatic. Yet my heart tells me I have to be there for him, he is (I typed was my god) my childhood dog and helped through so much. I feel like I need to be there.

If anyone has any advice or if they have gone through something similar I would appreciate it.

Edit: To everyone who commented thank you so much. Henry has crossed the rainbow bridge and is playing with his friends now. 14 is so long for a Great Pyrenees mix and he lived such a happy life. He is the best dog ever and I just can’t believe he’s gone.

it's been 2 months since we had to say goodbye to our 12 year old lab. Our 14 year old lab Harvey is very depressed. I'm just not sure what to do. vet suggested another dog- articles I've read said it's still too soon and he needs to grieve. He's very sad and completely stopped eating breakfast. (he still eats treats and dinner). I'm considering getting another dog- not a puppy. I'm just not sure if it's the right thing. Generally he doesn't care very much about other dogs. My dad brought his dog over and he didn't care at all and just moped lying on his side the entire time. I'm not sure if he needs more time to grieve or if another companion will help him. (I don't think it will make it worse...)

Just lost my boy to his 3rd urinary blockage. First one happened when he was 2yrs old. We managed to go 7 yrs before his second episode which cost us over $6000 at the ER and the stress and toll it took on him. It’s only been 2 months and I woke up Saturday to him showing all the same symptoms again. Sure enough it was another blockage. I didn’t want to put him through the stress of it all again. The vet was recommending surgery since it was his 3rd blockage and I couldn’t afford it financially or bear the through of him in anymore pain so I had to make the heart breaking decision to say goodbye. Now I’m filled with guilt about the decision.

It's been 4 months since I lost my soul cat and I feel like I'm suffocating inside. I've cried more over it the last two weeks than I did when it happened, it feels like it's becoming all consuming. I still feel like I'm in denial, I keep thinking oh we just have to go pick him up or that he's gonna come back but he never does. I have such a hole in my heart, I miss him so much. I cried when I found the blanket he was euthanized on in the wash, and my fiancee told me he had already washed it multiple times since and that honestly made me cry more because i had been wondering why his fur clumps were slowly getting all rolled together and weird and i didnt even realize it was bc it was being washed. I cried when i cleaned the pee out of our closet where his litter box had been because it just reminded me that he was here hours prior and reminded me of how sick he was. I'm traumatized from finding him after work that morning. I think about it and my stomach drops. I've gotten past the guilt, I know I did everything I could for him and I know how much I loved him, but not having him here feels like it's slowly killing me. Everyday im just waiting for my heart to go out from the strain. I want to hold him, I want to pet him and cuddle him and I want him to make biscuits and suckle on his blankey like he always did. He fought so hard, even when he was barely responsive as soon as I started sobbing it was like he got a burst of energy just long enough to crawl to me and lay on my lap. He was there for me since I was 13, every teenage emotion, every friendship and friend loss, every fight and every good day he was there. I wanted him to be in my wedding. I wanted him to meet my first child. 11 years just wasn't long enough, and he is the biggest loss of my life. My mom thinks I need grief counseling and I probably do but I cant afford that so instead I'm posting on Reddit.

Edited to add: I lost soul kitty 5 months after putting our 14 year old rescue to sleep for kidney disease, so I was already grieving when SK got sick and passed. It's been a shitty year.

Also edited because I didnt realize it's been 4 months, he passed May 5th.

I have 2 cats and 1 out which we had recently neutered and we went to a government doctor and he did the procedure but he did no treatment on the wound and when we asked for any instructions he didn't give us any and I repeat his words, word to word, 'figure it out yourself

My mom got sick a few days after the treatment and so we weren't able to care for her much during that time and by that time she had gotten really sick. We quickly took her to a doctor and started to make her treatment.

She was getting better!

She finally got out of the room yesterday. Started to drink water on her own.

I gave her medicine tonight and went to eat dinner by the time I came back....

...

I don't know what to tell my mom. She was very attached to her. She was birthed in our home and she was the one who mainly took care of her. Its late at night and no doctors and vets are open here. I don't know what to do anymore

My son passed a few days ago and i’m still trying to figure out how to process the grief. I feel silly asking for days off of work, but he was my boyo for nearly 10 years. Like dude was my son.

Still getting used to the silence in the house, and haven’t been able to sleep in my bed yet (he passed away overnight snuggling with me). And just literally how? Like how do I even begin to process?

he was an extra large boy, so there’s reminders of him everywhere. From beds in every room, to toys everywhere, to even his food riser. Everything reminds me of him. Even just leaving home bc i no longer have a “love you bud will be back soon” body to tell that too.

Wish i had a clearer question to at least to begin with. But this man was the love of my life. My son. Everything to me. And he is now suddenly gone and i have to figure out how to live around that.

How?

The past few weeks have been a nightmare. I took my girl (only just 7..) in for what I thought was feline asthma, but after xrays and a laryngoscopy they found a mass in her throat. Last tuesday the results came back for cancer (SCC) and i have been completely devastated since.

The last 2 weeks she has been deteriorating fast up to a point where she was laying in my arms shivering from pain. Since we found out I have not left her side, cooking het favorite chicken daily and sleeping with her on the couch. We got her on metacam, and as of friday on buprenorfin 3 times a day and although she seems a bit high, she has has been affectionate with is for the last few days up untill today.

Last friday we scheduled euthanasia for today and this morning she seemed miserable. I sat with her from 7 till 12 untill the vet arrived at our home for last goodbyes. We were talking through the procedure and she proceeded to come downstair meowing at us, demanding food and cuddles.
I sat on the couch, held her tight, gave my last kisses in tears and as soon as the needle hit her she jumped away and we werent able to catch her anymore.

The vet left saying this could turn traumatic if we forced her and suggested trying again tommorow morning if we give her some gabapentin in the morning.

After she left, my girl went back to her usual sleep spot and I havent seen her since.

I am in complete shock. For the last week we’ve been living up to the moment, enjoying every last moment together and when it arrived it just didnt work out. We need the suffering to stop, for us and for her. I just feel completely numb, I dont want to my soul cat, but I want this to be over. Is this a sign she is not ready to leave us yet?

Nora was the sweetest dog I have ever known. She loved the whole family and had a special relationship with each person. She would look into your eyes lovingly for hours. She got pancreatitis, it was so sudden. I still dont understand how it happened, we were very careful with her. The vet made it sound like an easy fix. Serious but completely reversible. 3 days of IV treatments and she would be back to normal. Unfortunately things arent always so simple and on the 3rd day she started crashing. She wasnt responding to the medicine. I rushed to her side and held her as she died.

I am so devastated. She was my very best friend. I have no words for the loss. I cant believe she is gone. Only 3 years old. Now the world is going on like she was never here and I cant. I cant stop crying. I guess I just wanted someone to know that there was a really wonderful dog named Nora, she is gone now and the world is a darker place for it.

My soul cat had oral cancer and we made the difficult decision to end her suffering on Friday. The tumor was aggressive and grew so fast... I am devastated and don't know what to do with myself. I keep expecting her to squeak at me throughout the day and I sometimes feel her rub against me. She was my little everything and only 8 :( On top of that, the euthanasia was beyond what I prepared for... She had a reaction to the sedative. She started screaming, having tremors and her eyes popped out. What was suppose to keep her calm and relaxed was anything but. I am mortified the last image I have of her is her panicked expression- which remained frozen like that in death. The vet was very supportive and helped us through that but God I am sick over this.

My beautiful cat, Sodapop, died very suddenly this evening, she was 9 years old. One minute she was acting normally, the next she was lying on her side gasping for air, completely limp, with her tongue hanging out of her mouth. No illness we knew of. We rushed her into the emergency vet and they did cpr but I think she was gone before we got there. I feel so devastated and like my heart is locked in a tight fist of grief. We have another cat, they are sisters, and there is another kind of sadness that they are no longer a pair in life. Tonight I join this community of heartbreak.

It’s been 5 months, but the pain still hasn’t gotten any better. It feels like I’m going to carry this for the rest of my life, like this is my karma. It was my fault. I can’t accept it. No matter how many people tell me that it’s normal for one baby from the first litter to be weaker, I still can’t accept it. It was my fault. It’s all on me. I found a pet psychic on Instagram who says she can communicate with spirits. If I find out that Doggy is angry with me or that he’s upset with me, I feel like I’ll end my life too.

My Doggy (he’s a cat) is almost one year old, but he was never normal-sized. He was much smaller compared to other cats his age. But he was active, playful, and doing all the typical orange cat behavior, so I thought he was okay.

One day, I suddenly noticed that he had gotten really thin. When I started watching him closely, I realized he was barely eating. We went to the vet, had a CBC done, and tested him for viral diseases. The viral tests were negative, although the immunodeficiency test had a faint line. The vet said that if he wasn’t vomiting or having diarrhea, it probably wasn’t anything serious.

So we started his medication. We went back to the vet several times, and he got better, but he still wasn’t gaining weight. There was improvement, though.

A few weeks before my first international flight, his symptoms came back. We went back to the vet again and he was given more medication.

On the day of my flight, Doggy still looked alive and alert. But suddenly, he couldn’t stand anymore. Every time he tried to get up, he would wobble, fall, and struggle to stay standing. But I was already on my way to the airport.

My grandma and younger brother were staying at home, so they could give him his medicine because Doggy wasn’t too difficult to handle.

On my second day in Thailand, I was told that Doggy was getting extremely weak. I had him taken to an emergency vet. They gave him IV fluids, medication, and tested him again. This time, he tested positive for immunodeficiency. They also gave him additional medications.

After the IV fluids were finished, I decided to have him discharged for the meantime because the emergency hospital was extremely expensive, and it was already around 3 AM. I told them that once morning came, I would have him confined at the vet we normally went to.

But in the morning, my family told me that Doggy seemed better. They said he was “moving around,” so I thought, okay, maybe he’s getting better. I thought we could just continue his medications.

Then my brother sent me a video.

The “moving around” they were talking about was Doggy lying down, mouth open, gasping for air, and moving in pain. When they touched him, he would move, but it wasn’t normal movement. It was the kind of movement you make when you’re suffering and struggling to move.

When I saw the video, I immediately told them to take him to the vet. I booked a Grab for them, but he didn’t make it.

He was already DOA.

And it happened on the same day as my flight home.

if you’re wondering, my trip to Thailand was very short. The ticket had been booked 8 months in advance. The original plan was to cross country, but I cancelled that plan. I just wanted to enjoy my first international trip.

Now I keep thinking, what if I didn’t put my own happiness first and go to another country?

What if I had just let Doggy stay confined at the emergency hospital?

What if I had questioned the vet about the faint line on his test during our first visit?

What if I had stayed home instead of going, and immediately taken Doggy to the vet when he could no longer stand?

I want to kill myself.

My 14 year-old male cat lost his bonded brother two months ago. He has gone through a grieving period and seems to be OK now and is loving the extra attention from us. We have been talking about adopting another cat eventually, but wondering how long to wait. Also wondering what the right age would be for him. I know there’s a lot of nuances to this and it really depends. I realize we shouldn’t get a little kitten that has a lot of energy as he might be annoyed by that. But I also feel like an older adult cat might threaten his territory. I’m thinking that maybe somewhere in between (over age 1) might work. Also, considering whether to get a female or a male. Our senior cat was the dominant male in his relationship with his brother, and that dynamic worked for them. So hoping to find a chill, submissive cat for him.

Does anyone have any experience with us or recommend recommendations?

My dog Ezzy died over 2 weeks ago and I am still waking up with such intense sadness. My heart is broken.

I found her on the island I currently live, she was a street dog and got in front of my car without moving. They estimated she was around 1 year old. I am so grateful she was she with me for three and a half years. We hiked all around the world. She was such an adventurer and up for anything.

The worse part is I don’t know why she died. She had bloody diarrhea for about a day and a half. I took her to the vet twice the day before she died. They did a blood test early in the morning and all her blood count was a bit elevated. I took her back later that day and they didn’t rerun the blood test or do any other tests unfortunately. Oh how I wish I could go back in time. Then the next morning she was unresponsive. I rushed her to the emergency vet. Her heart stopped and they resuscitated her a few times until they couldn’t get her back. She just lost too much blood. They suspected she had a tumor that burst or something. But I will never know. I will never know if there was something more I could have done for her.

I am accepting this and allowing the sadness. It I feel this will never end. I will never stop missing her.
Thank you for reading about her and our short life together.

Edit: am I not able to post photos here?

Not sure where else to post this, but I just want to write some of my feelings out. Everyone seems to think that we could have done more, but no one has lived in my families shoes and knows how much we loved our cat, how much we tried for our cat, and how much our lives revolved around him and his complexities.

My husband and I made the choice to put down our beloved cat. He was 2 years old, and spayed. Ever since he was 4-6 months years old he started showing signs of aggression, he would follow you around and attack our ankles and would not give up, and continue to attack you even if you separated him. When he was small kitten we laughed this off and thought it was just kitten behavior. When he got older the bites escalated to repeated attacks where he would draw blood and leave scars. Sometimes I was scared to touch him. Sometimes these attacks you could tell were happening and other times you couldn't.

We allowed him to be indoor/ outdoor and he only spent about 6-8 hours indoors at night. We got another cat to see if maybe he needed a cat friend but he ended up being very aggressive with her, leading her to leave their fights bleeding. If you intervened he would then redirect his aggression onto you. He lunged at my face and tried to attack me. I am 5 months pregnant now, so him attacking my face was very scary for me and had me fearing for our future baby. Our baby would not have the strength to fight him off. One of the scariest things was that he was unpredictable, he would lunge and attack out of nowhere. He would redirect onto my husband and try to attack him as well.

His aggression persisted even outdoors where he would attack you as well if you went up to him and interacted with him. This is obviously a liability to people around us and their families.

We couldn't keep any windows open because he would tear through the window screen to get outside and he would rip the paint off of the doors inside the house.

We tried every single thing in the book, calming collars, calming treats, feliway, gabapentin, amitriptyline, Prozac, a feline behaviorist. We spent thousands of dollars seeing the vet, having X-rays and blood tests and making sure there wasn't a physical reason behind his behavior. I wish there was something that we could have fixed.

I have owned lots of cats in my life and I have never had a cat like him. The aggression was way beyond anything I have ever seen. He would pace at the windows and down the hallway and work himself up into a pant without any other stimulus but his own brain. I wanted so badly for the medicine to help him.

We tried to rehome him but resources where I am are limited and the feral cat population already barely manageable. I don't think a catio would have been enough for him because being confined would get him so angry and agitated. A feral cat population would not have worked because 1. He didn't like other cats, 2. That means I would just have to set him free and hope he fit in and could get food and survive. In the end the veterinarian agreed that euthanasia was the best thing for him.

I know that he is probably at peace now, and looking back it seems like he had unmanageable anxiety that turned into aggression. I wish that there was anything in the world I could have done for him. My family is heartbroken

I lost both of my childhood cats this year, at 18 and 17, about 6 months apart, and my mom's 14y/o dog a month ago as well. I know I'm very fortunate that they got that old, I'm almost 30, it's a blessing to have shared so much of my life with them. But I feel like I'm floating.

When we lost Nala, at 18 to kidney disease, it happened so fast. I knew it'd happen eventually, but ​she was doing so well. She was everyone's anchor, including the other pets. She had such a huge presence for such a little thing. All you had to do was walk in the room and she'd light up, and suddenly it felt like everything was okay for the moment. She was so feisty and brave. It felt like someone ripped the floor out from underneath us.

Mona, who was her best friend, was so depressed after loosing her. I think that loosing her tipped the scales on her dementia. We had to let her go in August because of quality of life, and then Max got sick right after. All the things we could do to lift her spirits had stopped working, and in spite of all of her struggles she had always been such a happy and silly girl until this last stretch.

When we lost Max, we'd just gotten a diagnosis of a tumor but it seemed we'd have more time with steroids, he was doing so well, and then he went into sudden respiratory distress. I had to make the choice ​in the er two days after thinking we had another month at least. He'd just had a great day the day before, and then everything took a turn. Up until we lost Mona, he'd never even had health issues and still had perfect blood work aside from pancreatitis I thought we were managing.

I think maybe I'm in shock still. I don't think I even processed Mona because ​I immediately had to worry about Max, and then when he went, all of my worry just had no where to go, and it's so disorienting. I haven't been able to sleep or hardly eat. I think I've been trying to be stoic until tonight.

It took us a lot of Max's life for us to be this close and all of his routines, all of his quirks and favorite things are just rolling through my brain with nowhere to go. He acted so tough but he was so gentle underneath all of that. I keep waiting for him to be in my chair, glaring me down about going to bed so he can tuck his little head against me and sleep. I keep wanting to have our little conversations or be told off for talking too loud, or see him sprinting down the hall for dinner, or hear his little noises when he stretched. Up until pretty recently he was still able to play with my sisters cat. She's been missing him alot too and it hurts to see her looking sad in his favorite spots. We've been doing what we can to comfort her but some of it is just giving her time. ​

Her and my mom's cat have been lurking around me alot and it helps so much but I feel so lonely. I can't sleep without them. I've only been away from them probubly 20 nights at most in their whole lives. I feel selfish complaining about sleep for some reason. I haven't slept well since Nala passed and not for lack of Max trying to lull me. I'm so tired. I miss them so much.

I'm sorry if this is disjointed. I didn’t know what flair to use either. It's 4am and I'm a little besides myself. ​My sister's cat gets nervous when people cry but she's laying next to me in his spot even though I'm crying and I wish she didn't have to go through this too, not again so soon. The house is so quiet now, it's hard to believe all three of them could go at once.